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Old 03-30-2012, 12:03 PM   #57
WitchOfDoubt
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Kenichi Nakamura puzzled over the second clue, pulling out a periodic table from a chemistry book on the bookshelf. Sodium carbonate? Hmm... no, that didn't fit any of the songs. The records had to hold the secret to solving this.

It didn't seem like a cipher or cryptogram of any conventional kind, he reflected. It almost certainly had to do with the contents of the songs themselves.

"Hey, dudes.... how'd we solve the bead puzzle? With the solder and all that?" thought L. V. aloud.

The first clue was even trickier. Batsheva tried reading the lines aloud, ignoring the blurred-out text, to see if anything jumped out at her. They had already begun testing records, and the answer to that clue certainly was not one of the first nine songs.



Ocean flipped back and forth through the singles, looking for any pattern, and then... it hit her.

She pulled out a pencil and paper, and had it in seconds.

HOPE BRINGS AN ANSWER

"Could it mean...? No, of course not, that would be ridiculous." It was likely that they were not meant to use this clue just yet, but it would be helpful shortly. "Hope brings an answer..."

Little did Ocean know that an uninvited guest, spying upon the proceedings from the landing above, had heard what she said, and had jotted down a hasty scribble in her notebook. "Weird," she muttered. But before this watcher - a girl of no more than twelve - could think further on this, she heard footsteps approaching, and swiftly ducked into the Club's computer room as two security guards turned the corner.

It was Maria Brand and Sal Lucas, a set of new additions to the Club staff.

"Man," said Sal, a portly but well-muscled man of about forty. "Boss's got us working long hours. Why they gotta do it at midnight?"

"They don't want anybody to find out," replied Maria, coolly, adjusting the walkie-talkie at her waist. "Would you?"

The girl furrowed her brow, pulled out her phone, and quietly set it to record the conversation for later.

"Eh, gates locked," Sal smiled easily, reflecting on the last set of sacrifices. "Nobody's getting back there until it's time. Disappearances happen all the time 'round here, anyway."

Ducking further into the shadows as the guards passed by, the girl wondered just who - or what - was going to disappear. Should she tell her mother? But the Witch said she absolutely couldn't be seen by anybody!

The clock struck seven. Five hours to midnight.


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(The second solution to the maze remains undiscovered; if you're stuck, remember that even if the Witch had a different last name in her second marriage, her first name was likely unchanged. This should give you the first two moves through the maze...

The first clue to open this safe is a tricky one. One possible way to solve it would be for multiple posters to listen to different songs and use teamwork to find the answer. I've eliminated the first several songs, so it's got to be in the second half of the list.)
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Last edited by WitchOfDoubt; 03-30-2012 at 12:28 PM.
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